Speechless, 1996. RC print.© 1996 Shirin Neshat. Photo by Larry Barns. Courtesy of Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York City.

Scott MacDonald 623

Turbulent, 1998. Production still. © 1998 Shirin Neshat.Courtesy of Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York City.

626 Scott MacDonald

nuns, I ended up having a very difficult experience. It was a bit like livingin detention. I slowly became ill and developed anorexia. When I went

back to my home town after a year and a half, most people could not rec-ognize me because I had lost so much weight.

During the late 1960s and early 1970s, it was felt that a Western educationwas a good thing. Most upper- and middle-class people were beginning tosend their sons abroad to study, but my father sent both his sons anddaughters abroad to England and the United States. Eventually my two sis-ters abandoned their education, returned to Iran, and got married, where-as I ended up remaining in the U.S. and eventually developed a career. Myfather of course was very proud and often talked about it before he died.

SMD: How did you end up at Berkeley?

Possessed, 2001. Production still. © 2001 Shirin Neshat. Courtesy of Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York City.

630 Scott MacDonald

SN: Yes, of course. Iraniansnot only could read and un-derstand the meaning of thepoetry but are also very famil-iar with the history and placeof the writers in relation toIranian society–somethingthat would be impossible totranslate to Westerners.

SMD: How did you make thetransition from photographyto film and video?

SN: I had been working withphotography and the subjectof the revolution since 1993,but by 1997, while I remainedtotally interested in the socialand political realities of mycountry, I felt the urge to

move beyond the realm of pol-itics and take a more philo-sophical approach. While

thinking about reformulating my concepts, I thought it was also necessaryto change the medium that I was working with. I had grown frustratedwith the limitations of photography, at least in the way I was approachingit. Photography was a medium that I had no training in, but had developeda particular style, which became the Women of Allah series. I needed a medi-um that offered me a new level of lyricism. So I made what felt like thebold decision to shift from photography to the moving image. My first bigattempt was a video I shot with two cameramen in Istanbul.

SMD: Is this Turbulence?

SN: No, this was The Shadow under the Web, a piece with four simultaneousprojections, shot in Istanbul in 1997. This was an installation that basicallydepicted a woman (myself) draped in black chador running simultane-

Offered Eyes, 1993. RC print and ink. 11 x 14 inches.© 1993 Shirin Neshat. Photo by Plauto. Courtesyof Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York City.

Scott MacDonald 635

SN: It is very complicated, if not impossible for someone like me to film inIran, because of the controversial nature of my subjects. Also, another fac-tor has been the ambiguity in whether I am safe in Iran or not, and Ihaven’t wanted to take the risk. But even though I work in these other–safer–countries, I pretend that I’m in Iran; I’m very cautious about thetype of architecture that I use. For example, I stay away from the tradi-tional, authentic architecture of that country.

In Rapture, I filmed in the fortress in the city of Essaouira, because thisspace was a relevant location for my concept. The architecture of a for-tress, particularly in Islamic cultures, represents a typically male space, as itsuggests ideas of the military, war, defense, all the roles that are associatedwith men. Ironically this fortress was built by the Portuguese in the fif-teenth century (I believe), but most Islamic cities traditionally were sur-rounded by walls–a fortress. The city of Marrakesh is a vivid example ofthat. There was another personal attraction to this fort which was thatOrson Welles shot some scenes of Othello (1951) there. Orson Welles spent alot of time in Essaouira. He is very much loved by the local people.

Rapture, 1999. Production still. © 1999 Shirin Neshat.Courtesy of Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York City.

638 Scott MacDonald

SMD: Can you explain the nature of the speaker’s speech?

SN: He was delivering a moral speech about the subject of sin–sin thatarises from desire, temptation for the opposite sex. He uses the story ofYoussef and Zoleikha from the Koran. Similar to the story of Adam and

Soliloquy, 1999. Production still. © 1999 Shirin Neshat.Courtesy of Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York City.

Scott MacDonald 643

public plaza and becomes the focus of everyone’s attention, she imme-diately disturbs the space and divides the public into two groups: thosewho support her and her freedom to behave as she desires due to madness,and others, furiously insulted by her presence, who demand her immediateremoval.

SMD: We see people arguing in the square after she leaves. Her freedomhas instigated a debate.

SN: Exactly. She creates what we call Fetneh, a social chaos among thepeople. Possessed becomes more obvious, in terms of its narrative and itsmessage, than Rapture and Passage, which are perhaps more ambiguous andabstract. I personally prefer the latter direction, but I am very happy that Iexperimented with what is so far my most conventional film.

SMD: In Pulse, I’m not sure exactly what the woman is doing. First we seeher from a distance; she’s on the floor, holding something, and then as we

Possessed, 2001. Production still. © 2001 Shirin Neshat. Courtesy of Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York City.

644 Scott MacDonald

get close, she seems to be holding a radio.

SN: Yes. We carefully organized the room so that it had the feeling of abedroom, but also resembled a prison cell. The radio becomes her accessto the outside world–a tool for escape from her immediate environment.As we approach the woman voyeuristically, we hear her voice singingalong with a song that is playing on the radio. She seems to be lost in herown state of ecstasy–fantasy. The entire film was created in one uninter-rupted shot from the beginning to the end, from the moment the cameraentered the room with the sound of a pulse to the moment when it exitsat the end of the song. There was something very erotic and sensual aboutthis movement and her posture. There was no clear narrative but a sort ofglimpse into a private moment of this woman’s life.

SMD: Do you think of those two films as a diptych: public and private?

SN: Well, I never quite thought about it like that, but it is possible to drawthat conclusion as they were made at the same time with the same actress.To me the visual organization of Pulse was very different from that of Pos-

Tooba, 2002. Production still. © 2002 Shirin Neshat.Courtesy of Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York City.

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The text written on the woman’s face and in translation above is from Forugh

Farrokhzad’s Remembering the Flight: Twenty Poems, trans. by Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak

(Los Angeles: Ketab Corp, 2004), 71. © 2004 by Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak.

I’ll be greeting the sun againand the stream that flowed in meand the clouds that were my long thoughtsand the painful growth of the aspens in the grovethat passed through droughts with me.– Forugh Farrokhzad

Seeking Martyrdom #2, 1995.B&W RC print and ink. 11 x 14 inches.

© 1995 Shirin Neshat. Photo by Cynthia Preston.Courtesy of Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York City.

Untitled, 1996.RC print and ink. 11 x 14 inches.

© 1996 Shirin Neshat. Photo by Kyong Park.Courtesy of Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York City.

abovePassage, 2001. Production still.

© 2001 Shirin Neshat. Photo by Larry Barns.Courtesy of Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York City.

rightRapture, 1999. Production still.

© 1999 Shirin Neshat. Photo by Larry Barns.Courtesy of Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York City.

left and above

The Shadow Under the Web, 1997.Production still.

© 1997 Shirin Neshat. Photo by Larry Barns.

Courtesy of Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York City.

left and above

Fervor, 2000. Production still.

© 2000 Shirin Neshat. Photo by Larry Barns.

Courtesy of Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York City.